Addicted to porn? That's unlikely, according to researchers

Although we've been told that pornography is an addiction, it turns out that isn't the case at all. A new study says the brain activity of “porn addicts” actually decreases when viewing X-rated images.

The research, published
in the journal Biological Psychology, “provides clear
evidence that porn does not look like other addictions,” Dr.
Nicole Prause, sexual psychophysiologist, neuroscientist, and
lead author of the study, told Medical Daily.

Prause and her colleagues examined 122 men and women, 55 of whom
reported a “porn problem.” While an EEG recorded the
participants' brain activity, the volunteers viewed photos
categorized as pleasant, neutral, and unpleasant. Half of the
pleasant photos were erotic.

In particular, the researchers were focused on something called
the “late positive potential (LPP),” which is a common
measure for the intensity of the brain's emotional response at a
given moment.

“The
size of the late positive potential reflects the intensity of an
emotional response,”Dr. Dean Sabatinelli, co-author and
an associate professor at University of Georgia, explained in a
press release.

So, for example, if someone addicted to nicotine were to view a
photo of a cigarette, their LPP would intensify. The same goes
for cocaine addicts, who would experience an “increased LPP
to cocaine-related pictures,” the study notes.

But that simply doesn't happen with porn. In fact, those who
identified themselves as porn addicts showed a lower – not higher
– late positive potential when viewing sexually explicit images.

Even those who said they had experienced “major problems” with
their porn usage “showed decreased brain reactions when shown
the sexual images, rather than heightened activity,”
according to the research.

According to Prause, this finding “means it is not
appropriate to call porn addicting from a scientific
perspective.”